I can hear his footsteps as he paces the ground, feel the rain as it falls, heavy and cold. My head is in agony, a lump already forming when I reach up to touch it. How long have I been out? My sight is blurred, but I can see Guy up ahead, hear him talking, mumbling to himself. I attempt to sit up, push myself to safety, but my arms are weak. I hear footsteps. It’s him, striding towards me.
‘No, Chloe, be careful. Don’t move.’
I try to edge away from him, but he scoops me up in his arms, holds me close.
‘Get away from me,’ I tell him, my words slurred and incoherent. I have no energy to fight.
‘I can’t understand you.’ He lies me down, tucks his body close. He kisses me, his lips cold and wet against mine. ‘I never could understand you, Chloe. All I wanted was for you to be with me, for us to be a family. You should have stayed with me. I never wanted to hurt you. Not then. Not now.’ He squeezes me tight.’
I don’t know how long we stay there, lying in a nest of wet leaves, his arms wrapped around me. I can feel his weight, his breath, the warmth of his touch. I drift for a while, in and out like I did in the hospital, uncertain whether I am awake or asleep. Am I bleeding again? Is my brain swelling? I try to wriggle out of his grasp, but as soon as I move, he reaches for me again.
‘Get away from me,’ I say, pushing at him with limp arms.
‘We can forget all this, Chloe. Put it behind us. We have both made mistakes, right?’
‘You killed my son,’ I shout, edging away from him. ‘You took him from me.’
‘You think I killed him?’ He looks as if he might cry, one hand on his chest, his palm flat against his heart. ‘How could you say that after I told you what happened with my brother? It was an accident. You hit the car, forced me off the road.’
I shake my head. Pain tears through me, throbbing hot and cold all at once. ‘You took him. It’s your fault he’s dead.’
‘You wouldn’t listen, Chloe. You forgot how perfect we could be.’ He gets to his feet and looks down at me huddled in the dirt. ‘I think even now you can’t remember how good we were together. How many times will it take for you to fall for me before you understand what we have? Your father keeps telling me to be patient, to give him time, but how long am I supposed to wait?’
‘My father?’
‘He’s helping you, Chloe. He’s helping us. Soon you’ll have forgotten your old life, and we can build a new one together. It’ll be so good, I promise. Only yesterday you woke in my arms in my flat. How many nights did we dream of that? Don’t tell me it didn’t feel good. I know it did. That’s why I can’t understand why you’re wearing that.’ He snatches at my hand, pulls at my finger in a desperate attempt to remove my wedding ring.
I struggle against him, try to fight. Thoughts of my father’s lies overwhelm me. ‘Whatever we have between us now is not real, Guy. I didn’t know what you’d done.’
He stands like a jack-in-the-box, dropping my hand. ‘I didn’t do anything,’ he shouts. He begins pacing back and forth, his feet heavy in the wet ground. Talking to himself. ‘It wasn’t my fault. You hit the car. You ran me off the road.’
‘You kidnapped my son.’ I haul myself backwards, desperate to get away. The effort feels monumental. I listen out for the sound of a car on the road above, but I hear nothing. Nobody will find me here. I feel around on the ground, searching for something to arm myself with. A rock, a branch. Anything.
‘It’s not too late. You can still tell the police that Damien Treadstone ran you off the road. That would be it, over. Finished. Your father told me that’s what you would do, and I don’t understand what’s changed.’ I shake my head. He takes two quick steps, one foot either side of my body. ‘But if you’re not going to do that, you leave me with little choice.’
I see him raise his fist, bring it down towards me. In a desperate burst of energy I kick up with my legs, one foot striking him in the groin. He buckles and I use the chance to crawl away, hauling myself across the ground. I can feel his hands grappling for my foot and I urge myself forward, my fingertips struggling to find a grip. I scream as he drags me back, pulls himself on top of me. It’s hard to breathe as he grips my throat.
‘Stop shouting, Chloe,’ he says. ‘Nobody can hear you.’
My hearing begins to fuzz over, his lips moving soundlessly. And in that moment, as my vision fades, I know that this is the place where I will die. I try to focus on his face, my eyes full of rain.
‘When will you understand that I won’t let you go?’ he says. ‘I can’t, Chloe. I love you so much.’ The pressure of his grip grows, his fingers locked around my neck. I try to breathe. I can’t. I can’t see. This is it. He’s going to kill me.
‘I’m sorry,’ I say, as loudly as I can, though it comes out as little more than a whisper. But my apology isn’t for him. It is for Joshua, for the fact that he was lost because of my mistake. It is for Andrew because I ruined our last chance to make things work. It is also for me, to beg for absolution in my last moments.
‘I’m sorry too, Chloe,’ he says.
At that moment I see blurred movement behind him, and the pressure of his touch eases as he senses something coming towards us. I watch as his eyes widen, as his body collapses away from mine. A deck of cards, down. And in his place I see Andrew standing there, a huge tree branch gripped in one hand. With the other, he reaches down and scoops me up, and I cling to him as we make for the embankment. We reach out for anything we can find to hold onto, hauling ourselves forward up the uncertain slope. But before we reach the road, we hear movement behind us, and I turn to see Guy back up on his feet.
‘Andrew, faster,’ I shout, but it is Guy who picks up his pace. He lunges forwards, grabs hold of my leg. Despite Andrew’s efforts to hold me tight, I slip back down the embankment. Guy grapples for my arms, but this time his movements are slower, less precise. I manage to slip from his grasp and pull myself forward on the strong root of a sturdy tree. I cling on tight with one hand, search for a weapon with the other. Still Guy’s hands grip my leg. And then finally my fingers brush against the sharp surface of a rock, and my hand slips around it. As Guy pulls me back towards him, I let go of the tree root.
I don’t give him a chance to take hold of me. I channel all my strength into the rock, striking him again and again, the spray of blood warm against my cheeks. He slips to the ground, lifeless, just as Andrew reaches my side.
He helps me up and we stand there for a moment, staring at Guy’s body, prone, face down. ‘I think I killed him,’ I say, dazed. Andrew doesn’t react; instead, he picks me up and carries me up the embankment, not stopping until we reach the edge of the road.
There he sets me down and cradles me close. His fingers move to check my head, oozing blood. I can barely see the trees on the other side of the road, but I can hear them, disturbed by rain and strong wind. I hear the wail of a police siren approaching. I keep my eyes on the embankment, waiting for movement through the leaves, waiting for Guy to appear. What will we do if he does? Andrew holds me tight as we both gasp for breath.
‘Are you OK?’ he asks.
‘I don’t know,’ I reply. I look at my husband, here, now, saving me. ‘How did you know I’d be here?’
‘The police got the CCTV footage, found evidence of Guy taking your car on the night of the crash. They went to his house to look for him, but he’d already left. They called your parents and Jess told them you were with him, and where you were going. She called me because she knew I was closer than the police. She found the New Hope flyer in your coat pocket.’
Thank God he came. I gaze down the dark road towards the sound of the sirens getting closer. ‘They’ll be here soon.’ I look back to Andrew. ‘What if I’ve killed him?’ I ask, certain after that many strikes he must be dead.
He shakes his head. ‘Then it’s over,’ he says.
The first police car pulls up along the side of the road. I see DS Gray heading towards us. DC Barclay runs just behind. She pulls a torch from her belt and flicks it on, veers off towards the trees.
‘Is he down there?’ DS Gray asks, and I nod in reply. He calls to DC Barclay. ‘Cath, be careful.’
I watch the torch beam as it bleeds into the thickness of the woods, disappearing as DC Barclay descends the slope, and I think about everything I’ve lost. Precious things that can never be replaced. But that is also how I know that Andrew is still mine.
Because after everything that’s happened, he is still here, still holding on. Despite all those years, all those times I thought he was lost, I realise, as he holds me in his arms, that he must have been here all along.